My Grandpa would make his special blend of catfish “cheese” in January of each year and would let it sit and get “ripe” as he called it, until our camping trips. As a child, I would get as far to the back of the boat as possible but nothing would escape that smell. You would have that lingering odor on you for days on end. I could never believe it when we would pull up hundreds of pounds of catfish, a few alligator gar, the occasional snapping turtle, and even more rare, an actual alligator. Whatever it was that made it smell so rancid was the same thing that made it irresistible to the fish.

It wasn’t until years later that I finally got ahold of my papa’s recipe for both his cheese bait as well as his “blood ball bait”. These recipes and catfishing technique have served my family quite well over the last few decades.

Check out the video from Outdoor Guy for the step-by-step guide on how to make a chum dispenser:

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Now, if this thing works as it should, you’ll be reeling in big cats all day without getting nasty blood bait all over you! So what do you do with them when you get them? If you’re like my family… You eat them, usually fried. But first, you have to filet them, a job which most people (myself included) absolutely despise.

So how do you clean and filet your catch of the day? Let us know from your comments below!